What Counts as Sex

Overall, I really like my new therapist. She’s open to the queer/kinky/poly stuff, and though she’s cis/straight/married/etc she seems excited to learn.

Plus, she’s Canadian so there’s not the weird religious vibe about it you sometimes get with Americans. Just more of a “Hey, that’s not my experience, but what’s it like for you?”

There was just a slightly weird moment right at the end of my session this week. We were talking about my current relationship and how we met. I mentioned offhand that previously I’d only been with women.

She said, “So wait, he de-virginized you in the heteronormative way?” To which I responded something along the lines of, “Uh, yeah, I guess so…”

She’s not the first person to be (to me) overly surprised to learn my current partner is the first man I have been involved with sexually. But I had plenty of penetrative sex before I met him. And it always feels like people who ask those sorts of questions are invalidating lesbian sexuality in a backwards way.

At least my therapist admitted up front that she knows it’s heteronormative thinking. I always feel weird about people who treat PIV like this huge special deal – as the end-all and be-all of sex.

On the other hand, I don’t want to make it seem like it doesn’t matter.

I have a special connection with my partner that makes me willing to let him put his biological penis inside of me where I would not allow the biological penises of thousands of other men to go. That isn’t insignificant. But I also don’t think it’s quite as big of a deal as people make it out to be, you know?

There are a lot of people who don’t want PIV sex or can’t have PIV sex for a variety of reasons. And it feels like the emphasis we put on the importance of PIV sex makes it seem like their sexuality or sexual lives are less valid than everyone else’s. That you haven’t “really” had sex until you’ve had PIV sex (or PIA sex? because no one would argue gay men haven’t really had sex, would they?)

I feel like on the scale of being a big deal, the first time someone put a finger inside me was more of a big deal than the first time a biological penis went inside me. Any “first” is kind of a big deal in it’s own way, I guess. But I just feel like there’s all this extra emphasis on PIV in our culture.

And while I like it, if that’s all my sex life with my partner was, I wouldn’t be into it. Part of what I enjoy about what we do is that there’s also plenty of oral sex and fingering.

It was weird at first for me to realize I was attracted enough to a man who was attracted enough back for us to have sex, only because that’s unusual for me, and only because effeminate bi guys are hard to come by sometimes I guess.

I don’t want to go the opposite direction and say, “No, really, it was nothing.” Because that feels disingenuous, too. It wasn’t nothing. But it wasn’t everything, either, you know?

The sex I’m having now doesn’t feel too different really from the kind of sex I’ve had before with women. It’s better because we’re really compatible. But the major difference is that he doesn’t have to go strap his on.

I enjoy the power exchange of PIV or DIV (dildo in vagina) sex. But for me it’s always more about the connection I feel with the person, rather than the act itself. Maybe this all boils down to bi invisibility?

When I’d only dated women, it was impossible for anyone to imagine me having sex with a man. Now I’m with a man, and it’s very surprising for people to learn I had sex exclusively with women previously. I want to have sex with people whose energy I like, and that will probably mean they lean toward feminine energy.

But I don’t think my relationship with my partner is special because his is the only biological penis that’s been inside my vagina. It’s special because of how much we have in common. It’s special because of our emotional connection. It’s special because of our D/s connection. It’s special because of the time and history we share.

PIV sex is not insignificant, but it’s part of a much bigger picture. I don’t think I’m a freak, so it’s odd when other people are visibly freaked out by my sexuality.